


A star in the night

by Lumeriel



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Explicit Sexual Content, False Memories, Gay Sex, Implied/Referenced Torture, Loss of Identity, M/M, Prisoner of War, Recovered Memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:53:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 19,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24808825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lumeriel/pseuds/Lumeriel
Summary: Faenar, Captain of Angband, has chosen his reward for the fall of Dorthonion. He has chosen Melkor's new slave.But lying with the slave awakens memories that Faenar is not aware of possessing.Who is Faenar really? And why does the fallen Elf King get so easily under his skin, in his soul?Faenar: According to some, this should be the correct translation of the name Fëanáro into Sindarin.*Title comes from here:“A star in the night / And a bearer of hope”,Time Stands Still (At The Iron Hill), Blind Guardian.
Relationships: Fingolfin | Ñolofinwë/Morgoth Bauglir | Melkor, Fëanor | Curufinwë/Fingolfin | Ñolofinwë, Fëanor | Curufinwë/Morgoth Bauglir | Melkor
Comments: 54
Kudos: 85





	1. Chapter 1

_What you hold in your hand_

_(…)_

_Give it to me_

****_Into the Storm, Blind Guardian_   
  


He walked along the torchlit corridor. The red and gold firelight cast long shadows on the clammy, wet walls. Blood still trickled from his leather and metal armor, leaving a trail on the uneven slabs.

The smallest goblins and a few slaves scrambled hastily out of their way, plunging into the gloom. The pale-skinned goblins pressed against the walls, vainly trying to control the trembling of their fragile bodies. At first, he had looked at them with disdain and anger, but now he didn't even look down at them.

His soldiers had scattered to the barracks as soon as they reached the fortress. He had promised Draugnir and Balcheth that he would join them after appearing before the Dark Master.

The orcs guarding the door to the throne room pulled away with a grunt between clenched teeth. A smile twisted the corner of his mouth: he knew the monsters watched him with hunger and envy. Unlike them, he retained the perfect beauty of his birth. When his soul opened itself to the glory of darkness and the power of fire, his body did not degenerate. He was, like the Dark Master and the Necromancer, a creature of beauty and death.

“Faenar.”

Morgoth's dark voice spoke his name like a silk caress.

Faenar strode across the room, staring at the gems in the iron crown.

Only before the Master's gems did he feel the pull of the light that was once part of his being. He didn't miss that light - he didn't even really remember it - but he was curious sometimes.

"My lord," he said, stopping before the stone throne, lowering his gaze in a mimicry of reverence.

Morgoth half-smiled. Faenar suspected that his displays of rebellion were still attractive to the God of the World - even if the occasions when he called him to his bed were increasingly rare. Especially since he got his new toy.

Faenar's silver and igneous gaze swept over the white form at the foot of the throne.

"They tell me that the battle was a resounding victory."

"The elves fled."

“Their king…?”

"Fingon _the Valiant_ did not go to the field this time," Faenar pointed out, his tone mocking remarking on the nickname of the High King of Barad Eithel.

"Another day you will bring me his head."

“It will be my pleasure.”

Morgoth watched him for a few seconds with his golden eyes and smiled, twisting his lips to the left.

"I have not yet rewarded you for your victory over Dorthonion. Two beautiful elven princes destroyed by your hand”, he commented stroking the rings on his right hand with the other hand.

Faenar blinked slowly. He knew what Morgoth was offering and although he admitted within himself that he had missed the experience of being in his bed, the Dark Master was not a generous lover. Claimant, voracious, overwhelming ... never generous.

"What do you want as a reward, Faenar, my beauty?"

The voice of the Lord of the World was again like velvet in his ears, still full of the screams of anger and agony.

Faenar looked up at the stones that seemed to shine with the light of a thousand stars. His eyes of silver and fire descended to those of the god.

"Your slave."

Morgoth could not hide the surprise that flashed in his eyes.

_"My slave?"_ He repeated incredulously.

Faenar raised the hand in which he still held the double-edged ax and pointed to the pale silhouette at the foot of the throne.

"Your slave. I want your slave to serve me. For seven moons.”

For a moment, he almost waited for Morgoth to order one of the Balrogs to whip him. It was evident that the Dark Master had become fond of his new toy.

And it was no wonder, Faenar admitted as he allowed his gaze to drift along the chain that attached to the sapphire ring on his middle finger. The other end of the chain connected with a gold ring attached to the leather necklace that surrounded the elf's throat. Only a silver belt and strings of pearls around his narrow hips adorned the slave's nakedness. Black hair was combed into numerous braids, clearing the angular face, almost too beautiful.

"You can have it."

Faenar turned his attention to the face of the Lord of Arda.

"You can have it these seven nights," Morgoth agreed with unexpected generosity. “Enjoy it all you want. And don't worry if you break it a bit - we can fix it later. Rest, my precious. Tonight, you will have your reward.”

This time, Faenar made a half bow, too stunned to notice the malicious gleam in the Dark Master's eyes. As he straightened again, his eyes lingered for an instant on the white form of the slave kneeling on the frozen floor.


	2. Chapter 2

For a moment, Engelil's stunned gaze floated into his mind. It was only a few weeks ago that the female had managed to convince him to spend a night in her bed and he had to admit that the enchantress was better than he expected from her small body and full hips. But Engelil was crazy if she thought she could compete with the chance to taste the Master's precious toy.

He wasn't even convinced yet that Morgoth would keep his word. He was also not sure how much he would really enjoy. He had made the request at random, even if he recognized that the slave had attracted his attention from the first moment. Of course he knew who he was: like the rest of Angband's captains, he had witnessed the duel between Morgoth and the Mad King of the Western Elves. He had seen with his own eyes how the elf wounded the Master of the World - seven times! - and how he paid for his madness. He had seen his body being dragged towards Angband amid the howls of the orcs. He had been to the feast that celebrated victory and had seen the still wounded king being dragged with chains to the foot of the stone throne - a mass of blood and broken limbs. Until Morgoth told the Necromancer to fix it.

_"One more to collect, my lord?"_ Mairon had asked, with the disdain he always showed when Morgoth chose a new toy.

_"One more gem for my treasure,"_ the Dark Master had laughed.

Faenar opened the doors of his chambers with both hands and closed behind him before turning his gaze to the bed.

The white shape was clearly drawn between the cushions and the cover in black and red.

He approached with inaudible steps; however, the slave raised his head, alert.

Faenar looked at the silver band that sealed his eyes. Rumors claimed that Morgoth had gouged out the elf king's eyes as a memento of his victory… and because someone once said that those eyes were more beautiful than Arda's stars. Rumors claimed that Morgoth kept the king's eyes in glass in his chamber; but Faenar had not seen them on any of his intimate visits.

Even without the light from his eyes, the slave's face was still dazzlingly beautiful. Smooth and angular, his features seemed chiseled in marble. His mouth was pale and full and his throat was a white column that invited.

Faenar had kept numerous elven slaves in his bed. Unlike his companions, he did not feel the slightest attraction to the morbid distortion of beauty that the orcs constituted and his desire was only awakened by creatures that imitated his own perfection.

Faenar knew that he was beautiful - more beautiful than the same Maiar who served Morgoth - but that did not stop him from recognizing that the slave was a unique, different creature.

He moved closer to the bed, watching it from above.

The High King of the Elves. _The Mad King_.

There were stories among the soldiers, among the slaves ... They said that the first time Morgoth wanted to enjoy him, the slave had fought with such rage and force that Gothmog had to intervene. The result was that Mairon had to recompose the slave once more. The rumors said that for weeks, months ... a year, the prisoner resisted again and again. When at last he became convinced that he could not escape - that they would not let him die - he stopped fighting; but only to become this lifeless doll that remained kneeling for hours and hours. Why Morgoth kept it was beyond everyone's understanding; but Faenar only wanted to savor that cold white beauty once. Or seven.

His gaze slid across the slender body. There were no traces of the combat. No scars or deformities remained. His skin was a perfect alabaster, delicate, only broken by the perfect circles of nipples pierced by golden tendrils. The leather necklace from which the silver ring hung was still there, matching the belt from which dangled the rows of pearls. The black hair had been left loose and was swirling above the pillows and around his feet like a stream of ink.

Faenar put out a hand and with the tips of his fingers pushed his hair back to bare a pointed ear, adorned by obsidian bars and a gold chain that interwoven a web from the tip to the lobe pierced by a sapphire ring.

He ran the tips of his fingers along the curve of the ear, the line of the jaw, the straight neck ... to the edge of the necklace. He moved his hand and caught the firm chin roughly. He felt his blood rebel against the immobility of the slave. Others had jumped on him, eager to please him; others had tried to run away from his touch, insulting him with their tongue too sweet to offend ... but none had been ... _this_.

He clenched his fingers, forcing him to open his mouth and frowned slightly as he made out a black pattern on the slave's tongue. A magic seal: Mairon’s thing, of course. Maybe Morgoth got tired of listening to the slave.

For a second, he hesitated. Would Mairon's seal have any effect on him? Would it be a trap? He growled through clenched teeth: he would never know if he didn't venture.

He leaned down and brought his face close to that of the slave. Slowly, he thrust out his tongue and thrust it into his half-open mouth. He traversed the inside of the lips, the teeth of young wolf, the warm palate, the inert tongue ... He cocked his head and devoured his mouth, sliding his hand to tangle his fingers in the hair, on the nape of the neck.

It was sweet. Somehow, for some reason, his mouth was sweet as nectar, like a wine he never remembered ever drinking.

He leaned his head back, licking the line of saliva that connected their mouths. His sex throbbed hard under his leather pants. He looked down and saw with satisfaction that a slight blush stained the slave's chest.

He kissed him again. This time he held him more gently as he explored his mouth and gasped between bites. The marked tongue danced to meet his and Faenar played with it, wrapping it with his own, pulling lightly.

He slid his free hand down his bare torso, pinching his nipples, descending to his smooth abdomen, rummaging through the pearls. A hairnet of gold chains and gems contained the cock and testicles. Faenar traced the patterns of the chains and cradled the testicles in his palm, massaging.

The slave parted his thighs and raised his hips, allowing him better access, offering more than what Faenar was looking for right now. And although he was not looking for it, he accepted it. Two of his fingers crawled down the perineum, between the buttocks, pushing the chain from behind the belt aside, pushing into the tight hole.

The unctuous dampness made him growl hoarse. They had prepared it for him. He did not like the idea that he had been touched before bringing him; but a part of him shuddered at the mental image: he saw the slave on his knees, as Mairon slipped his long fingers inside, spreading oil… perhaps using his own cock to open him..

"Did they use you tonight?" He sued against the half-open mouth, moving his fingers inside.

He felt the elf's chest rise and fall with a silent moan. He moved his fingers more slowly and his cock pulsed, as if he felt the satin pressure around him.

"He… to prepare you… did he fuck you?" He demanded again.

The slave shook his head, denying and raised both hands to cling to his leather and silk covered shoulders.

"Better," he roared in a thick voice.

But inside he admitted that even if it had been Mairon's semen that lubricated his insides, he would not have resisted possessing him. Just kissing him had unleashed a hunger he never felt. There was something different about the prisoner ... Was it perhaps that he was a king? A western elf? Was it perhaps that he had given up his immobility for him? Or was it perhaps something deeper, something asleep in his memory, in his memories before his awakening in Angband's forges?

He possessed his mouth with brutality as he fucked the narrow canal with his fingers. The slave arched against his body, parting his thighs further, letting his open palms slide down the leather vest, tracing the outline of his muscular torso.

He stepped back, cursing loudly.

The slave froze, his chest rising panting, his hair tousled, the blush staining his pale skin.

Faenar struggled with the clips on his clothing, kicking knives, boots, and pants in his quest to free himself. Desire burned under his skin. His cock stood tall, wet.

He climbed onto the bed and grabbing the slave by one leg, he pulled him to place himself between his thighs.

In another time, in another life, such a creature would have deserved calm, to take the time to savor him and discover the thousand ways in which he could make him beg. Another day ... another night. Not today. Today he just wanted to be satisfied. He needed…

With impatient fingers, he tugged at the belt until he found the clasp and yanked it free. The tangle of chains and pearls flew to the side of the mattress, stripping a beautiful cock, arched upward, pale and firm like the rest of his body. He wrapped a calloused hand around the testicles, feeling the silk of their texture, the tension of sexual desire. Holding one hand to one side of the slave's hips, he took the other to lead inside.

The prisoner drew back, pulling himself up off the mattress and grabbing onto his shoulders, digging diamond-studded nails as the thick erection thrust into his body.

Even with the oil facilitating his advance, Faenar enjoyed the resistance that insisted on preventing him from taking it all at once. He did not stop. He did not hold back. When at last his pelvis collided with the other's body and he felt his thighs support the lower part of his abdomen, he gasped with satisfaction and gloated in the familiar narrowness.

Oh yeah. He knew that pressure around his cock. He knew the palpitations that announced pain and hunger alike. He stepped back a little and with a single thrust, filled him back to the root. A voiceless gasp was the answer and Faenar knew that the elf king's voice would once have chanted his name - half reproach, half supplication.

He sniffed around his neck, inhaling the familiar perfume _–familiar as a past too pleasant not to be painful._

He stepped back again and trusted in him again. Another dumb gasp.

He found his rhythm easily. Their bodies seemed made for this - to meet halfway, to fill one and gird the other, to unleash a storm of flesh against flesh filling the room with the essence of sweat and desire.

He bit his neck, his shoulder, his lobe. He claimed his mouth, digging his fingers into his buttocks, pushing him against the pillows, taking over the space between his thighs as if it belonged to him forever. His cock slid in and out, demanding more heat, causing a torrent of breathy breaths. He felt him arch. He knew that his toes twitched even without turning his face. He drew in his mind the scream silences with which he came, soaking the bellies of both. He knew that Morgoth had never seen this, had not felt the pleasure of the slave baptizing his skin, flooding his senses with the scent of moss and melted snow. He stabbed inside him with a hungry beast roar and filled him, dreaming _again_ of sowing life into his belly. He buried his face in the mane of night ink and screamed the agony of being back to _a lover he did not remember loving_.


	3. Chapter 3

He whirled around on his toes, swinging the ax in his left hand as he crossed his other arm in front of his face, stopping Draugnir's attack. The other warrior's sword slipped along Faenar's red blade and caught on the filigree guard that protected his fist. He turned the ax in his other hand and hit the face of his subordinate with the plane of the blade.

Draugnir stumbled back, howling in pain. His sword released from the grip of Faenar, who caught it before it fell to the ground and threw it at the other's feet.

"Well, it is clear that the new toy is not as 'wonderful' as we thought," laughed the female sitting on top of the beer barrel, raising a mug to her lips.

Faenar raised an eyebrow.

“How is that?”

"Draugnir bet you couldn't concentrate today," she explained after wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

"They say the Master stays in his rooms the whole day after using _it_ ," Draugnir added in a nasal voice, covering his broken nose with one hand.

"You guys are elven children to believe the crap that humans tell?" The captain's eyes narrowed.

"Then isn't _it_ that good?" Draugnir asked, lowering his hands.

Faenar caught the curious glint in the greenish-gray eyes and a wild roar formed in his throat. He clenched his teeth to keep from letting it out: it was stupid to be possessive with something that didn't belong to him, _that belonged to someone else_.

"He is like the others," he shrugged and sheathed the faca in the sheath held by straps to his right thigh.

“No, he is not.”

He turned to look at Engelil.

The sorceress took a few steps, swaying her hips. The jewels on her ankles clinked with each step. Instead of heading to meet him, the female approached Balcheth and took the mug from her for a long drink. The warrior looked at her with a raised eyebrow before exchanging a glance with her captain.

Faenar ignored his lieutenant's gaze and turned his back on them to strip off the mithril-coated leather armbands.

"How did you say, Engelil?" Balcheth asked. “Do you have proof that the slave is different?”

“He is the king…”

"The king of the elves is Fingon," Faenar interrupted. “Speaking of which, we should prepare to leave soon. We will go to the Falas.”

“Today? It is almost midafternoon. Don't you have six more nights with the king -ex-elf king?”

"When the week's over," he conceded. “If the Master has no other orders.”

Just half an hour later, Faenar entered the throne room. Out of instinct, his attention drifted to the kneeling figure beside the throne.

The slave, on the other hand, showed no sign of his presence. For a second, Faenar imagined blue eyes, bright as Northern ice, turning to look for him, flashing with a message that only the two of them knew.

"It is of exquisite beauty, don't you think?"

Faenar cast a sidelong glance at Mairon's elegant profile. Like every occasion, the Necromancer's red curls sparked an eager snake on his chest.

"Not as much as you are," Mairon admitted, running his golden eyes with long pupils. “You will always be ... the most precious jewel in our Lord's crown.”

“Faenar!”

Melkor's call interrupted the answer he might be thinking. Ignoring the Maia's smile, he approached the throne, this time without looking at the slave.

The Dark Master smiled, his gaze fixed on his captain. When Faenar came before him, he signaled to him and waited for him to ascend the steps to the throne to offer him a jeweled hand.

Faenar took the god's hand firmly and sat down on the arm of the stone seat. His eyes went up to the _silmarils_ and once again, hunger, the need to touch them pierced his heart like a dagger. He looked away to focus on the smiling mouth of the god.

"My lord," he said expressionlessly.

"I think I have been unfair to you, my beautiful Faenar," said the Vala, and his voice carried no regret.

"When, my lord?" He asked because that was what Melkor expected him to do.

The Dark Master of the World reached out and stroked the proud chin with the tip of his index finger.

"I couldn't resist," he confessed in a whisper audible throughout the room. “I had to have _him_ this morning ... after he returned from your rooms. I couldn't resist the temptation to have him when your smell and taste were still on him.”

Faenar felt his muscles tense. He could hardly avoid looking at the slave, checking ...

"I have missed you, my precious Faenar," Melkor continued, sliding his finger between the lapels of the silk shirt, drawing a pale scar on the tanned skin.

Faenar did not move. He knew this would happen, that Melkor would not keep his word, that he would seek a pretext for ...

"I will have to wait, I suppose," sighed the god, withdrawing his hand, with a pout of annoyance. “For you to enjoy your reward. Take it”, with a negligent gesture he handed him the silver chain. “Although I may have spoiled your fun tonight with my… anxiety.”

Faenar tugged on the chain, forcing the slave to keep up with him. The bangles and the rows of pearls sang, marking their silent gait.

He opened the door and shoved the elf into the bedroom, slamming the door behind them. He turned in place and his gaze fell at last on the other.

Spoil his fun? Melkor could go to hell!

Grabbing him by the shoulders, he spun him around to study the deep scratches that cut his back and hips. A recent cardinal adorned the inside of his left thigh, and teeth marks filled his belly and buttocks. He held his hand in the air, not touching the marked skin.

“It hurts?” He asked at last, brushing a bruise on his chin with his fingertips.

The slave shook his head and raised both hands, held together at the wrists by a carved piece of wood.

Faenar was taken aback when the prisoner's fingers touched his chin and mouth, tracing his lips before ascending to his cheekbones and temples. He closed his eyes under the caress on his eyelids and breathed in the scent of the other's skin.

“What do you do?” He growled, pulling away abruptly.

To his surprise, the former king smiled softly mischievously as he advanced in search of him. He grabbed him by the forearms and stopped him.

"We're not going to ... You're hurt," he declared with effort. “I want to enjoy you, not...”

The slave ignored his words. He rested his weight forward and being of the same height, pressed his half-open mouth against Faenar's lips.

The coldness he always displayed before the Court proved to be an elaborate performance. The slave's tongue moved inside Faenar's mouth with the certainty not only of those who trust his technique; but of who knows his lover.

Despite his initial intentions, Faenar responded to the kiss with wild longing. His hands tightened on the other male's forearms before moving of his own accord to cradle the firm butt and the back of his head. He felt the pressure of the slave's swollen sex against his crotch and his own cock reacted hardening, throbbing.

He forced the slave to twist in his arms, holding him against his chest, rubbing his erection between his buttocks. He buried his nose in the root of his braided hair, filling his lungs with its essence.

"You want me," he muttered hoarsely against his skin, sucking wet kisses down the spine of his neck.

The prisoner's chest rose and fell several times rapidly.

"You want **me** ," he repeated, and the certainty poured like liquid fire into his bones.

“Why?” He demanded, closing his arms. “Why me when you have -when you have the attention of the Master of the World? A god ... You have the desire -the lust of the most powerful of the gods ... why would you want ...?”

The prisoner twisted in his grip with a force that spoke of years of training, of struggles. He turned in front of him and gripped the lapels of his red shirt with stiff fingers to pull him. He kissed him violently, with a hunger and despair that Faenar did not feel even in the first times that Melkor called him to his bedroom. And the worst part was that he knew that hunger and despair.

An image flashed behind his eyelids.

A garden, a statue ... the shadow of the cypresses on the fresh grass ... a place created for pain and loneliness turned into a refuge, a keeper of secrets ... passion ... his hands touring the slim body, undoing clothes and ribbons ... his mouth devouring moans and promises ... hunger, the need to possess, to mark, to retain ... and the answer ... his lover returning every caress, every kiss ... and that lover was...

He threw his head back, panting.

"You ..." he modulated in a hoarse voice.

His gaze lingered on the silver band that covered the prisoner's eyes. He raised a hand and tried to release it, to rip it off.

The elf hissed through his teeth and stepped back, freeing himself from his arms. With a jump, he walked away to the other end of the room.

Faenar narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

The slave paced back and forth, opening and closing his fists, hissing through his teeth like a cornered beast.

The Angband captain intercepted him, grabbing him by the shoulder. The prisoner showed him his teeth in a threatening grimace; but he immediately calmed down and leaned forward, buried his face in Faenar's chest, breathing in his scent.

Faenar took him by the chin and made him lift his face.

"He took them, right?" He said calmly, controlling the rage inside him. “Your eyes. He ... Melkor took them from you.”

The elf's lips trembled and Faenar felt an urge to reassure him, to… protect him.

“Who you are?” He demanded in a low voice. “Why…? If you could talk...”

The prisoner raised his bound hands and gently touched his temple. Then he shook his head.

Faenar was stunned, suddenly understanding what the former elf king suggested.

_Osanwë_. Only the most powerful between the elves managed to use this communication channel reserved for the Ainur. Not even him that ...

The elf's lips on his interrupted his thoughts.

Fuck it. He would only have six more nights to enjoy this. He wasn't going to waste them thinking.

Surrounding him with both arms, he lifted the prisoner upright and carried him to the bed.


	4. Chapter 4

Faenar felt the hair on the back of his neck stand on end and spun in place as the ax slid down his arm into his hand. He drew a circle with the arm in the air and severed the elf's head. The decapitated body staggered to its feet for a few seconds before collapsing sprawled.

For a moment, he stared at the spread-eagled body on the floor and thought of the pale figure who for three nights had already been tangled in his sheets and arms.

He grunted under his breath and spat at the corpse's feet. He was growing too fond of the slave, a slave he would never have again after the seventh night was over.

"They retreat," Balcheth announced after him. “Shall we follow them?”

"How many survivors?"

"A dozen perhaps. They left the wounded.”

Faenar turned on his heel, swinging the ax in his hand almost playfully.

"Without prisoners. Burn the bodies.”

"The sarquindi will not like that," the female pointed out.

"As if I care what those slaves say."

He hastened to his rooms. It was midnight.

He would have preferred to stay in the fortress during the day; but being locked up was not his thing and there came a time when Angband seemed to weigh on his shoulders, his back, his soul.

He would take a bath. His muscles had worked harder than usual in the past few months since the Battle of the Flames. The elves had been concentrating on rebuilding what they managed to rescue and finding a match was very rare. A lot of soldiers, much less common.

He entered his bedroom and stopped when he discovered the figure sitting on the edge of the bed.

The slave was motionless, head bowed over one shoulder, the thick braid resting on the bed like a sleeping snake. Instead of the rows of pearls, he wore loose black pants, similar to those worn by some of the humans serving the Dark Master.

Faenar was painfully aware of the blood streaming from his armor and forearms. He clenched his fists and without a word walked across the room to the bathroom.

He cursed under his breath as he tore the armor to pieces. He got into the tub carved out of the living rock, and the cold water tightened his muscles at first.

He winced when a hand rested on his shoulder. For a moment, he was stunned by the prisoner's daring; but he immediately remembered that he was the damn elf king. He almost laughed out loud as he realized that the elf king - the same one who faced the Dark Master in a duel and wounded him - was washing his back. From the blood of his own subjects.

He wondered if he knew what he had been doing, if the slave knew why he was coming back at that hour and what was staining his skin. The answer came when long-fingered hands brushed the bottom of the bone mask and there was no reaction from him.

The mask. He had forgotten to take off the mask. There was no way the prisoner had forgotten those masks, who wore them ... _or why_.

His body felt lighter - freer - when the mask was lifted off his face.

The slave's fingers returned to his face. Slowly. Tracing his features. Washing down the red and black paint that tinted his cheekbones and his mouth. He closed his eyes, resting his head on the edge of the rock.

The elf's hands slid down his shoulders to his chest and parted lips caressed his ear, the curve of his jaw...

He realized how much he had missed this. His kisses, his caresses ... the quiet intimacy.

He sat up, freeing himself from the prisoner's hands.

“Don’t.”

He hurried out of the tub, tripping over his own feet.

He fled to the bedroom, leaving a wet trail.

With a low roar, he turned to face the slave. He knew he had followed him out of the bathroom - with his wild cat gait, with his agility of eternal warrior.

He stared at him with anger, with hatred. Until that moment it had not occurred to him to hate the slave. _A slave_. He was just one more slave - more beautiful than the others, more valuable; but only a slave. He had no power to harm him, to take something from him. An ornament. The once High King of the Elves was only an ornament, a jewel in the crown of the Master of the World.

And yet he hated him. Faenar hated him. He hated the Elf King. _Fingolfin_.

He hated Fingolfin, he suddenly understood.

He repeated the name in his mind. They did not usually call slaves by their elven names in Angband. They nicknamed them - generally derogatory, sarcastic. Until then, the former king was only "the new slave." Faenar had not thought of him as a person until...

Fingolfin had not moved. Standing in the middle of the room, his hands damp with water and his fingers stained with blood-red paint, he seemed to be watching the Captain of Angband's internal struggle.

Faenar narrowed his eyes.

With a jump, he locked the slave in his arms, digging his nails in his back, in his neck. He tangled a hand in his ink-like hair and pulled hard, forcing him to throw his head back.

“What are you planning?” He demanded under his breath. “What is your trick this time? What elven witchcraft are you using to get into my head?”

The elf did not fight. He rested both outstretched palms on his bare chest and stood still as if he were sure that Faenar would not hurt him.

Faenar ran his eyes over the serene face, his calm mouth, and his gaze slid to his white throat. The tiny mark attracted his attention. So small! How was it possible for Mairon to overlook it?

A vision appeared in his mind.

A sword - _his sword_ \- against that throat like alabaster. And Fingolfin's silver-blue gaze. Confident, serene, certain that in the end, he would never harm him.

He roared from the bottom of his chest, furious at that certainty that nothing could erase from those blue eyes like stars.

He pounced on him how he pounced on his enemies. Elves were weak - creatures made of dreams and hopes that the darkness devoured. A little pressure and the elves broke, distorted. Fingolfin would also break. In a month, in a year ... in a thousand ... in the end, he would break. And he would be there to...

_To what?_

He stopped thinking to focus on licking and biting his half-open mouth. His naked body reacted immediately. The satin fabric of the black pants rubbed his sex, his thighs, and the desire overflowed inside him, hushing any other emotion.

He held the elf in his arms - not like a maiden, but as if it were the prey he caught after a long chase.

He left him in bed just to support one knee on the mattress and descend on him like a hungry beast. He bit and licked his neck, his chest, his bare shoulders. He traced anxious hands over the muscles that usually looked asleep. He untied the laces that tied the pants and pulled the garment down. His fingers ran the length of the half-hard sex between his firm thighs as his breath warmed a nipple pierced by an obsidian pin.

Jewelry. For a second, the idea of covering this precious body with the work of his own hands - and only the work of his own hands - flooded his mind like a tidal wave of fire.

He pulled away just to make the slave turn. He held him by the hips at the edge of the bed and promptly pressed into his furrowed entrance with the tip of his eager cock.

He took him all at once, filling him completely, dreaming of the moan Fingolfin would give him in another time, in another life. He felt his back taut against his chest with each breath and lay still, savoring the pressure around his shaft, the brush of skin too cool. Eyes narrowed, he slid his lips parted along the clear nape of the neck.

_Fingolfin..._

The name got stuck in his throat, wrong.

"My jewel," he murmured thickly. “My treasure. My star.”

The elf shuddered below him and Faenar knew he had found an important piece of his life, of both of them. But at the time he couldn't think. His body demanded - _his soul_ demanded to take what belonged to him.

He lost himself in the frantic rhythm with which their bodies were. The throb of his own blood sang in his ears.

_My star. My jewel._

Lying on his stomach, one arm stretched out to hang out of the bed, Faenar stared blankly into the semi-darkness of the bedroom.

He had never wanted someone such deeply. He was aware that his desire for Fingolfin would only bring him trouble, but he couldn't help it. He couldn't help going to him, claiming him, losing himself in his body, yearning...

He held his breath as the wet brush touched his shoulder. He hadn't felt the mattress shake when the slave moved to approach him. He felt his fingers slide down his spine and back up into the space between his shoulder blades. He sensed that the tips of his fingers were drawing something on his skin and for a moment, he believed that the elf king intended to cast a spell on him. He was stunned to realize that he was writing letters. _Fingolfin was writing on his skin._

He concentrated on following the movement of his fingers and recognized the symbols he traced over and over. They formed a word. A name.

_Fëanáro._

A flash of fire and darkness filled his mind.


	5. Chapter 5

Pain seared his body, ripped his nerves, devoured his skin. He never thought he would fear fire so deeply. He never thought that fire - his friend for as long as he could remember - could become his enemy.

He opened his eyes panting, choking on his own breath.

"Already awake, precious?"

The voice like velvet, like steel in the forge, caressed his ears and he knew that it was that voice that had called him from the pit of flames into which he was sinking without remedy.

His lips moved, trying to form words, but the voice did not come. Not the words. Ideas were on his mind, but he couldn't manage to order them. He tried again, trying to ask...

"Sshhhh ... still, little one." The voice caressed his ear, warm and thick. “I'll take care. I will take care of you. Just -just remember, my beauty. Let me share your memories.”

His eyelids fell, heavy as palatial curtains, and he sank back into darkness.

_I run down the sidewalk, laughing. Laughter takes my breath away as I dodge the heavy branches of flowers. The perfume of flowers and fruits fills my lungs, my chest ... and floods my mouth with more laughter._

_I let out a short screech as arms catch me, lifting me up into the air, spinning me around. I open my arms like wings and lift my face to heaven. I look down to meet the giggling gaze of the raven-haired elf with silver eyes._

_Father._

_My heart sings the word, laughing._

_Father._

_My world._

_She is beautiful - beautiful as Laurelin and Telperion intertwining to create a creature of light. Her eyes are like gems made of pure heaven._

_I look at her absorbed, thinking that I have never seen such a beautiful female. For a moment, I wonder why father brought her here. Does he think...?_

_"Son, I want you to meet Indis."_

_I look to my father's smiling face and I think I've never seen him laugh like this - as if all the light in the world had been caught in his chest._

_“We are going to marry.”_

_I don't understand what father is saying and I frown._

_“How do you say?”_

_"Indis and me. We’re going to marry, my son. You will have a mother. And brothers.”_

_I don't want brothers. I don't want a mother. I have a mother. And I don't need brothers. I certainly don't need that gaudy boy with black curls and plump cheeks who follows me everywhere. Doesn’t he get tired? Every time I turn around, there he is, looking at me as if I've hidden something from him. And then he smiles._

_Why are you smiling, useless brat? What makes you think you can smile when you see me? What makes you believe that you can hang on my clothes and look at me with those starry eyes? What makes you believe that you can force me to lean over and lift you up, and carry you with me while you laugh… laugh and chirp like a little bird?_

_I see him before he sees me. He has grown in the last months that he was in Alqualondë. I take a few seconds to observe it at ease._

_At first glance, he is everything like my father –dark, tall, and proud, noldo from-head-to-toe. However, a close look reveals the thinner pointed ears, the soft golden skin, the slightly longer fingers ... all traits inherited from his mother, Indis the Fair. And his eyes._

_At last, he turns and sees me. A smile curves his mouth and I respond unconsciously._

_He crosses the room, barely answering his greetings, and stops two steps from me._

_"Welcome home, Nolvo," I say, laughing despite myself._

_His eyes - like sapphire stars - light up and leaning forward a little, he confesses:_

_"I missed you, Curvo."_

_His mouth. I am sure that I have dreamed of his mouth all my life, from my mother's womb._

_I devour his mouth. Finally._

_One of my hands tangles in his hair and the other pulls on his robes as I devour his mouth - beautiful mouth, with puffy red lips, clumsy tongue, and nervous teeth._

_I retire, looking for the breath that I lack and I find his surprised look. For a second, I doubt what I have done. Have I broken the bridge between us? Have I destroyed the precious harmony that until now gave birth to my days?_

_I don't have time to keep wondering: he jumps at me, wraps both hands in my hair ... and devours my mouth with a laughing kiss._

_His body is an exquisite fruit that I am never fed up with. I kiss every curve, every angle, every valley and every gap in his precious anatomy. It is the body of an athlete and a prince of stories. I lick a path from the nape of his neck to his buttocks and immerse myself between them, enjoying equally the warm aroma of his flesh and the shivers of his limbs. He groans and my blood speeds up. Fire rages in my veins as I rise to my knees on either side of his hips. I sink into him - in his heat, in his painful narrowness, in his hunger that engulfs me and rejects me - and I moan his name as a prayer._

_If a thousand years passed, it would not be enough for me to find a wonder comparable to the spectacle of seeing him dance naked in the secret garden of Míriel - this garden that knows our moans, our promises, our disputes, our reconciliations, our dreams._

_Music buzzes in my head, stirring my thoughts. Colors stun me until I see him. He looks like always - like when he came to me and gave himself to my arms, to my mouth, to my fantasies ... and then he danced naked in the light of Telperion among the shadows of the cypresses. Once again I wonder when we pulled away, when I let him go, when he slipped out of my hands like silica sand._

_His gaze meets me and for an instant - a heartbeat - I think I see pain and longing in his sapphire eyes._

_He turns around, evading me. Music drowns the beat of my own blood in my ears._

_The sword glows in Laurelin's terrifying golden light. Its blade is so long that it takes me a few seconds to see where it ends: at my brother's pale throat - **half-brother.**_

_My heart stops. I don't even know what I said, what words came from my lips that have stolen all the heat from his gaze. He steps back, curtsies and walks away - walks away from me, taking away my calm, leaving me insane._

_Screams. Screams. Screams._

_I run, clutching the sword at my right hand, ignoring the bloody bodies that pave my way. I see him and stop as my heart beats again. I go to him slowly._

_His cloak is torn. His braids are wet and sticky. A cut goes through his left cheekbone and before I think about anything else, I slide my finger along the bloody line. His hand grips my wrist and holds me firmly, anchoring me to reality. His eyes without light look at me sadly._

_"What have we done, Fëanáro?"_

_His voice stabs my chest. What have I done, my love?_

_I watch the flames rise into the sky. The swan ships disappear between the smoke and the death-colored light. At one end of the coast, I can see Nelyo's taut silhouette: his copper hair is the reflection of the fire that consumes the ships. I feel his pain, his anger ... and suddenly, I am aware of what I have done._

_What have we done, Fëanáro? What have you done, poor fool?_

_I force myself to remain motionless, trying to ignore the pain in my belly, in my lungs, in my soul._

_Oh Nolvo, my love! Don't hate me too much. Go back to your wife's arms, honor our father, cry on your mother's lap, be happy with your children ... **and forget me**._

_I feel the fire ripping my body, tearing my skin to shreds. The world is diluted in wisps of smoke and pain. My soul craves… How I would like to see your eyes one last time, my precious star, Nolofinwë._

He opened his eyes again and looked at the ceiling of the room he was in. A canopy surrounded by black and gold velvet curtains filled his vision.

“Oh! You're back. I'm so glad.”

He turned his head to discover the silhouette that approached the bed with a silent, undulating walk. His fiery hair aroused a feeling of familiarity in his chest, but before he could find the right memory, the other sat on the edge of the bed.

"We are very pleased to have you with us, my beautiful spirit of fire’. How about that? Do you like it? It is the name that our Lord has chosen for you, since you have been reborn from fire.”

_Spirit of Fire._

_Faenar._


	6. Chapter 6

The orc staggered backward by almost two meters. When they managed to stop, they leaned forward and spat out a bloody spit with two pointed teeth. They shook their head, crowned with three pale braids, and roared angrily before launching themself at their adversary.

Faenar flexed his knees and waited for the impact. At the last moment, he leaned on the toe of his left foot and spun around to avoid the attack. Before the orc passed him, he jumped on him and put an arm around his neck. He used his grip to climb onto his opponent's back and with the other hand covered their eyes, pressing his thumb. A liquid snap, followed by a howl, announced the sinking of the eyeball in its socket. The captain jumped away from the one-eyed orc, who lunged - blind in pain - after him. Faenar received them with a kick to the chest. Before the orc recovered, he propelled himself onto the other foot and struck out with the side of his foot directly to their temple. The orc collapsed lifeless.

Draugnir advanced to the center of the spectator circle and kicked the body.

"I think it's time to take a break," he suggested with a frown.

"I still have enough energy to...”

"The Necromancer will not be pleased to have to replace the whole garrison for a night of revelry," said the soldier, raising one of his white eyebrows.

Faenar grunted under his breath.

“Whatever.”

He turned and started to walk out of the circle of orcs and humans. His subordinate followed, exchanging a few sentences with one of the humans, who covered his head with a dark silk scarf.

"If you have that much energy," Draugnir commented upon reaching him, "I'm sure you have somewhere to spend it."

Faenar hissed under his breath at the suggestion.

The other stopped, puzzled. As soon as he was bored with the slave? Immediately, he approached him again.

"If you don't feel like your prize, Nazir claims that Queen Badra is more than willing to ..."

"To have a child of mine?" He scoffed scornfully. “The fire would consume her insides.”

"You don't have to get her pregnant. He is beautiful. To be human.”

Faenar evoked the image of the female in question. Yes, Draugnir was right: she was not bad to be human. But human females were too fertile. It wouldn't be the first time that one of those was looking for 'fun' and ended up with a bloated belly. Unfortunately, most died before the end of the pregnancy, and the Dark Master would not be happy if the most powerful of his allies died of a failed pregnancy. Especially if the father was Faenar.

"What did Nazir promise you in exchange for persuading me to fuck her mistress?" He asked, amused.

Draugnir gave a wolfish grin.

"A new detachment of recruits has arrived."

"Damn, Draugnir, they're barely old enough to wipe their asses on their own!" He grumbled with displeasure.

"They are in their teens. Humans mature differently than elves, Faenar. And let's not talk about questionable tastes: it is you who rejects a precious female by a mutilated slave whose, for some reason, you don’t wanna fuck.”

Faenar stopped dead.

Draugnir bit his tongue, understanding that he was talking too much.

"Let's go see that queen," Faenar decided.

He kicked open the door to his chambers. Anger and frustration burned inside him like living lava. It was impossible. What had happened was impossible. He was the damn ‘spirit of fire’! He had spent whole days in the Dark Master's bed. Where others had died of pain or exhaustion, he had been praised, adored, preferred. Desire, appetite, sexual hunger –were part of his essence. It couldn't be that...

The prisoner rose to his feet upon sensing his presence.

Faenar's gaze swept over him, lingering on the silver chain that linked the nipple rings, on the blue silk that encircled the waist and suggested the contour of the muscular legs. At that moment, he was fully aware of why Queen Badra's brown and generous flesh did not provoke any reaction in him.

Fingolfin took a step in his direction and stopped, as if he could feel his anger in the heat-laden air.

Faenar roared through his teeth like a cornered beast and leaped on him.

His fingers dug into his chin, forcing him to throw his head back.

“What did you do to me?” He demanded through clenched teeth. “What elven witchcraft did you use to get inside my head and screw my thoughts? What the fuck was that you put on my mind, you fucking slave?”

Fingolfin made no attempt to fight. With one hand, he circled Faenar's wrist and stroked the inside of his forearm with his thumb.

The gesture unleashed a surge of warmth and calm on the Angband captain's nerves - a gesture that was as familiar as the hand that made it.

“No!” He howled, releasing him with a thrust that launched the elf onto the bed.

Fingolfin crashed and fell to the ground, dark hair hiding his face and his naked torso like a silk curtain.

Faenar watched him with eyes burning with anger –and desire boiled in his blood, alive, ever present.

_Mates._

The word slipped through the mist of emotion, baffling him.

“What did you say?” He asked before realizing that it was stupid: the ex-king could not speak thanks to Mairon's magic seal.

_We're mates. You and I._

There he was again ... and Faenar understood that the words were ringing inside his head.

"What witchcraft is this?" He hissed, fixing his gaze on the elf. “How is it possible…?”

Fingolfin rose slowly to his feet and lifted his face in his direction.

_We're mates. We have been for hundreds of years. In Valinor. Remember that, Fëanáro._

Fëanáro.

The name unleashed shocks of anxiety and calm through Faenar's soul.

With an effort, he shook his head, seeking to rip himself off of emotions that didn't belong to him.

"Fëanáro was your brother," he replied crudely.

_You are. Half-brother. Don't you remember our father? Your mother, Míriel?_

"Your witchcraft shit is screwed," he laughed out loud. “I can't be your brother and your...”

_You shouldn't ... but you are. That is why I have been able to find my way to your mind once again. I have seen your memories. I have seen how Morgoth woke you up with the help of Sauron. It is possible that in doing so, he has severed your connection to those damn stones and restored the bond between us._

"Stones? What…?”

An image stole his breath.

The silmarils were in his hands. And they burned as if the light of the Universe was contained in them. He knew it in that instant –he had created them.

He blinked and saw his empty hands.

"No ..." he muttered.

_We will recover them._

Fingolfin's calm certainty made him look up at his blind face.

_If that's what you want, you will leave here with your stones. But remember that it was they who took us away once. Don't let them come between you and your children._

“Chil…dren?” He repeated with effort.

The world was filled with laughter, voices, red curls, golden braids, freckled cheeks, black manes, hugs –and love.

“What are you doing to me?” He demanded in a painful whisper. “Why do you want to make me believe that I ...? I am not your brother”, he denied with determination. “I don't know what your plan is, but I'll rip your skin off before...”

_Well. If with that you remember who you are, you can start now. I have come to Endorë for you - only for you. Everything I have done it have been only in the hope of seeing you again, of recovering you in some way –even if it was in the form of those damned stones that you love more than you ever loved me._

Anger twisted the elf king's sensual mouth.

_But I will not give up now. I was already dead, ready to die, when I saw you in the hall that night. I couldn't believe it: you were alive! After four centuries, you were alive. I mourned to you every night at Hithlum! I thought it was a trick of Morgoth, a taunt to torture me, but the bond tugged at me even without you knowing. Morgoth didn't know that: he couldn't have used it against me. I have waited for whole months for an opportunity. Do you think it was a coincidence that you chose me as your reward? No, Fëanáro. It was the bond between our souls, something that no power can break._


	7. Chapter 7

He raised the gold cup to his lips. Beside him, he heard the crunch of bones as Balcheth chewed them slowly. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of Engelil's raised eyebrow and almost smiled when his lieutenant offered a weight of meat to the sorceress, who rejected it with a frown at the blood and dripping fat. Faenar turned his attention to the front of the room.

The Dark Master occupied his throne. The light from the gems on his crown illuminated the scars on his face from his fight with Thorondor over the Mad King's body. Faenar's gaze went up to the jewels.

_... remember that they were the ones who separated us once ..._

The words danced in his mind, with a burst of light.

He saw himself again in a workshop, studying plans and making notes in a notebook. He found himself working in front of the crucible - sweat moistening his skin, his hands aching from the exertion. He felt the cold hands running down his shoulders, massaging, circling before moving to the planes of his chest. He felt the weight of **his** head on his back, the certainty that **he** counted his breaths… and breathed with him.

_"You work too much. You don't have time for me anymore.”_

_“You seem like a complaining wife, Nolvo.”_

Nolvo. Nolofinwë.

His gaze dropped from the _silmarils_ to the slave chained to the wrist of the Dark Master of the World. Standing on his knees, Fingolfin resembled the marble and ebony statue of a martyr.

Faenar saw the cardinal crossing the prisoner's abdomen and his stomach churned with anger.

"You look at it too much. The Master will eventually become jealous.”

He clenched his teeth, forcing himself to calm down before answering Engelil.

"Isn't it you who is jealous?" He replied. “The Master agreed to give him to me for seven nights.”

"Seven nights that will end on two trips to Ithil. What are you going to do? To beg the Master to take you back to his bed so that you can see your lover?”

The suggestion nauseated him.

"It is a trophy, a reward," he growled. “How could _that_ be 'my lover'?” He finished with a laugh.

Even in the distance, he felt the shudder on the slave's shoulders and was curious.

_I missed your laugh. It's been a long time since I heard it._

The voice was like a caress inside him. He hesitated at the proof that everything that had happened the night before was real.

_Aren't you afraid?_ He tried to speak to him by the same method.

_Of what? Have you forgotten that the bond between mates is forbidden for everyone else? Not even Morgoth can intervene in our connection._

_I do not know anything about that. We have no bond. I don't know how you did it, but I'm going to find out what you intend._

_Well. Tonight I will teach you a little more about what I intend._

Faenar was puzzled by the flirtatious purr of the last words.

He bit his lips as he pushed him against the mattress. Their naked bodies intertwined into a perfect cog.

At least in this, Fingolfin was right, Faenar admitted as he put an arm under his left thigh. He held it above his hip and entered him, slowly, delighting in the tightness that girt his swollen, hard flesh to pain.

The prisoner's hands tangled in his hair, using them as reins to bring him closer to his body, to his mouth. Faenar waved his hips, thrusting inside him, forcing the friction into the rawness of his tight entrails. It was his own gasps what filled the air.

The caress started at his center - somewhere between his stomach and his heart - and spilled through his body, following arteries, nerves, fibers.

Oh shit. He groaned so loudly that his throat burned.

Beneath his skin, the pressure was unbearable.

_You have to open up. Let me touch you._

“What…?” He stammered, his eyes unfocused.

_Open to enjoy it, my love,_ Fingolfin whispered in his mind as he ran his tongue over Faenar’s ear.

Open. Faenar tried to understand, tried to resist ... The tremors shook his body, making more hoarse moans.

He arched back, sinking into Fingolfin to the root. It was as if a flower of fire burst from his chest, its tentacles enveloping his body.

**He saw.**

He saw Fingolfin lying naked on his bed, back in Formenos. He saw his face too close as he kissed him with languid voluptuousness. He saw his challenging smile before running to the lake. He saw his exquisite features moved by the agony of orgasm...

**He felt.**

He felt it within him - the glorious duality of feeling and being felt, of giving and receiving. He felt his own pleasure tangled with the pleasure the other experienced.

How could he have lived until today without this? How could 'someone' have made him forget this?

His roar of despair and ecstasy echoed through the domed room. He collapsed on the prisoner's chest and laid wide-eyed, blind, as Fingolfin mopped his hair and hummed in his mind.

Gods! _His brother_ had a beautiful voice.


	8. Chapter 8

Silver light bathed the flowers and leaves of the trees. Beneath it, the dew mimicked diamond dust - diamond dust that also glimmered the elf's skin in front of him.

Nolofinwë half turned, twisting his torso and giving him a mischievous smile over his shoulder, his face half hidden by the curtain of hair like Telerin wine.

Sitting under the tree, he watched the light-tinged sky of Telperion through the broad leaves of the almond tree. He looked down at Nolofinwë, who was lying face down on the fresh grass. The younger elf's hair spread like a cloak from his back to his thighs.

He reached out and stroked the thick straight hair, stopping at the smooth mound of his athlete's butt.

Nolofinwë's hair was wonderful. It was like the fur of big cats showing melanism: at times thick black as ink, others a bluish hue and less frequently, a mahogany color that defied elven vision.

_You don't need excuses to touch my butt._

Nolofinwë's mocking voice purred in his mind. He laughed out loud.

_I've never looked for them_ , he admitted as he propped himself up on one elbow to kiss his bare ear.

_No, you haven't_ , the younger confirmed and his shudder of pleasure was replicated on the older brother's skin. _You have always taken from me what you have wanted._

_Because you have given it to me, my love._

_And I will always give it to you. All of me._

He opened his eyes to meet the slave above him. His gaze lingered on the torso that swayed above him, on the silver chain flailing with each sway, on outstretched arms… He felt Fingolfin's hands on his chest - open, his fingers carelessly playing with his nipples hardened with excitement. His cock throbbed - alive, hungry - in the tight interior of the other.

For a moment, he enjoyed the exquisite image that filled his soul with longing and certainty.

_Everything you want._

The grimace of rage bared his teeth and his hand shot up to catch the braided hair and pull hard, forcing him to bend with a twitch of pain.

"Liar," he roared against his face.

Fingolfin didn't try to break free, but he didn't stop the movement of his hips, either, propelling him up and down Faenar’s erection.

"You said I had you all, that you were mine," Faenar continued, digging his fingers like hooks into his hip and forcing him to stay still, their bodies so close that their veins throbbed together. “You said you would never abandon me, that you would not turn your back on me. And it was enough a stumble, a word, a disagreement ... to leave me like a useless dog, like a toy that no longer satisfied you.”

Now Fingolfin stirred in his grasp, showing his teeth in an angry grimace.

_Are you sure that's how it happened?_

_How else?_ He answered in his mind, inhaling the scent of sweat and sex on his neck. _“Who was the one who was scared by the possibility of being discovered? Who feared the punishment of the Valar more than ...?”_

_“Your stones!”_

Fingolfin stirred like a caged beast. Unable to release the hold on his hair and hip, he gripped Faenar's mane with both hands, squeezing until his knuckles paled and Angband's hissed in pain.

_“It was your obsession with your damn stones that separated us. Even after you put a sword to my neck, I was willing to follow you to hell, to be by your side –But your stones were the only thing that mattered to you. You didn't come to Endor looking to avenge our father. You came to retrieve your stones. And it's because of those damn stones that Morgoth has enslaved you.”_

“No!”

The scream tore through his throat as he spun, pinning Fingolfin between himself and the mattress.

"You are the slave!" He barked, ramming inside him in anger. “You are weak! You…! You!”

He broke off, panting. His body burned, overflowing from the inside out. He stared at the prisoner's twitching face, and the sight of the silver band covering where his eyes were unleashed a storm of pain and helplessness.

Fingolfin responded with a moan to the kiss that invaded his mouth with teeth and tongue, voracious. He used the grip on Faenar's hair to maintain the feeling of reality as the wild rhythm of the thrusts against his very center transformed the pain into ecstasy, into agony.

"What do you want?"

He asked the question in a hoarse voice.

Half seated between the cushions, his back against the back of the bed, Faenar drank from a golden cup with embedded gems. Fingolfin was lying between his thighs, his head resting on his striated abdomen, and his hair spread loose as a cloak over both of them.

"What do you mean by giving me these memoirs?" Faenar insisted, looking down at his half-brother’s calm mouth. “What do you expect me to do?”

_“Nothing.”_

His response caused the older elf to frown.

_“Everything.”_

"I don't understand you," he growled impatiently. “Do you want me to rescue you? Do you want me to help you run away?”

Fingolfin shifted to lie on his back and Faenar's gaze fell to his mouth again. Before thinking what he was doing, he reached out and traced his lips with his fingertips.

_“I want you to be **you**. I want you to be free.”_

“How? You cannot run away from the Dark Master. He -he is too powerful. And with the silmarils...”

_“If you choose to stay in Angband, next to him -let it be your choice, Fëanáro. You are not a puppet. You were not born to be a mindless slave. And don't think Morgoth is too powerful: it's not you talking. They are his tricks. It is you clinging to the silmarils. If you love them so much, take them. Tear them off his forehead. But don't make excuses. You never look for excuses.”_

The last sentence left the warmth throbbing in his center and Faenar leaned down to kiss him softly, withdrawing into his mind as he remembered that they only had one more night.


	9. Chapter 9

Faenar lay on the scrambled bed, naked and alone.

A slave had come to pick up Fingolfin an hour earlier.

The captain had not moved as the once High King of the Elves left his room being guided by a chain tied around his neck.

The seventh night - _the last night_ \- was over.

Faenar turned his head and buried his face in the pillow, inhaling the essence of the prisoner.

When he asked to spend seven nights with Morgoth's slave, he didn't think he would get so far under his skin. He did not think that the desire of the slave - of his white flesh, of his lips, of his heat, of his voice and his laughter bubbling in his mind - would become a fire in his veins.

_What do you want from me?_ , he had asked.

He clenched his fists on the silk lining of the pillow and screamed against it.

What did he want from himself? He wanted to go through Angband and wield the double ax, and unload its blade on Morgoth's neck ... and drag Fingolfin back to his bed.

_He's mine!,_ he wanted to scream.

His. His. Always _his_. How could he breathe knowing that perhaps at that very moment, Morgoth was erasing his kisses from Fingolfin's mouth, his scent from his body? How could he breathe knowing that surely at that moment he was riding him like a beast in heat and Fingolfin...?

No. Fingolfin would never accept what the Dark Master gave him. Fingolfin would be the lifeless doll in his hands again. The fire, the starlight, the essence of the universe, the song of the world -that, Fingolfin reserved only for him, _his mate._

He relaxed his shoulders, forcing himself to breathe slowly. He searched inside and delighted in the weight filling a gap that he did not know existed in his soul.

**The bond.**

He could feel Fingolfin there. He could feel the weight of his feet as he marked dance steps on the dewy grass. He could smell his hair after the morning bath. He could feel him fit into the gap between his chest and his thighs to rest after making love. He could hear his voice reciting picaresque poems in the same tone as a harangue on the Council. He could see his eyes twinkling like sapphire stars.

They hadn't spoken that last night. In silence, they were lost in passion, in ecstasy. Over and over. They had drunk from each other until Faenar was not sure who the moss and rain scent that filled his tongue was. Through the bond, Fingolfin had chosen to show him memories of his children.

He had forgotten the children that he loved more than his blood as he forgot his lover. A week ago, he had not known that he and the Lord of Himring were a unit, an impossible bond to break; this morning he wondered how he would go back to see him, to hug him, to kiss his cheeks now marked by torture.

His children. Maglor with his golden voice braiding emotions and stories. Celegorm with his easy smile and his misplaced aftershocks. Curufin, all pride, his spoiled child. Caranthir always thoughtful and paying attention to details that no one else noticed. And the little ones -the twins full of energy and malice. And Maedhros, his firstborn, his little flame, his piece of soul.

How had they been able to rip all that away from him? Was Fingolfin right, and the silmarils had enslaved him to that extent?

No. It was a trick. A lie of the Mad King. A trap to make him rebel against the only God of the World.

He rolled on the bed, roaring.

He hated Fingolfin. He hated him as much as he had loved him the night before. How dare he leave this chaos of doubt and anger inside him? How dare he knock down everything that was, what he had done in four centuries just with…?

He jumped off the bed, cursing under his breath. He tore off the sheets and pillows and gathering them in the middle of the room, threw a candlestick on them.

He watched silently as the fire consumed the fabrics and, with them, the memories of those seven nights.

The cell door banged open, hitting the bare wall.

Draugnir raised his head, bewildered, as he reached for the knife on the table.

The tall figure of Faenar filled the gap in the door and the soldier breathed out in relief.

The captain's gaze went from his subordinate's naked body to the person lying next to him. As he guessed, it was one of those children recruited by humans from the farthest tribes, with dark skin and intricately braided hair.

“What happen?” Draugnir asked, ignoring his superior's grimace.

“Let's go out. I need to kill something.” He turned on his heel; but he stopped to comment, "You really need to get yourself a real lover, Draugnir. One that gives you so hard in the ass that you stop chasing kids.”

"At least I don't eat them after using them," the other shrugged.

Faenar's eyes narrowed as he walked away.

Tonight, he would get as close to Hithlum as possible.


	10. Chapter 10

The throne room was more crowded that night. The Dark Master had had the condescension to invite his human ‘allies’ to share the evening.

It was unusual to see humans in the great hall, although Faenar knew from experience that the Second Children could viciously rival the orcs and even some of the Balrogs.

Before the throne, two human females performed a dance with long snakes, following the tune of double flutes. Faenar watched them without interest: the pronounced movements of the female hips and bellies only caused him to remember the times when he saw Fingolfin dance in Míriel's garden. Where human females were blatantly sexual - down to being obscene by elven standards - Fingolfin was all grace and fluidity, a steel ribbon undulating in midair.

Faenar contained the desire to direct his gaze towards the figure kneeling next to the throne. He wondered if the Dark Master knew that Fingolfin danced, if he had ever managed to force him to dance for him. He drowned the eruption of jealousy with a long gulp of dwarf beer - probably loot from some recent foray.

"I want to thank the World Master for allowing us to delight in his presence."

Faenar recognized Queen Badra's slightly deep voice and turned to look at her out of the corner of his eye. Yes, the woman was beautiful; but she was dreaming if she believed she would get a chance to get into the Master's bed. The highest she would go would be in the clutches of Gothmog ... and that was not a good prospect if she was just looking for fun.

"A gift to you, mighty lord," Badra added, bowing with her hands above her head.

Faenar raised an eyebrow when he saw the young man who two human soldiers led in front of the throne.

A slave was not a gift worthy of the Master of the World. Morgoth had thousands, millions of slaves! One more - human besides - was worth nothing. Except this one was worth _something_.

According to human years, he couldn't be older than those children they recruited for war - thirteen or fourteen years old. However, instead of having brown skin and curly hair like those teenagers, this one had pale skin like the humans serving Finrod's House and his hair was black like a raven's wing. With delicate and graceful limbs, his hair was divided into braids in which golden cords were interwoven. The little human's ears had been modified - probably through some surgical procedure - to look like the elves'. The boy's features were exquisite and… mischievous. His eyes were blue - a light blue hue that brushed against gray near the outer edge of the iris.

Faenar was almost glad that Fingolfin couldn't see.

“Fuck!” Balcheth grumbled, dropping the leg she was chewing. “It does look alike.”

And Faenar's lieutenant was right.

The Dark Master shared Balcheth's opinion as he leaned forward in his seat to better appreciate the appearance of the human adolescent and a lascivious smile curved his mouth.

"A great resemblance, Queen of the Moon," he said with bright eyes. “You really managed to imitate his essence when he was a teenager in my brother's land. Only that shine is missing in his gaze ...”

"Something that can be accomplished with the right gems, my mighty lord," the woman commented. “It is rumored that you have the best jewelers and artisans in the world.”

"Indeed I have," laughed Morgoth.

"Then you will enjoy this little present as long as I get you the original."

The Vala's eyebrows shot up with interest and finally, he half turned on the stone throne to face the human queen.

"Will you bring me the elf king, Badra?"

Faenar straightened in his seat, setting the glass on the table.

"Tsk," Balcheth hissed. “That human bitch wants to leave us out of a job.”

Queen Badra smirked and bowed her head to the Dark Master.

"The way you want it. Whole, in pieces ... just a few pieces ...”

Morgoth seemed to consider the offer for a few seconds. Absorbed, he shook the hand in which the chain was tied and it was as if he remembered the slave. He turned his face to look at Fingolfin, and his scarred face transformed to almost beautiful in the light of the _silmarils._

"I think I will prefer it entirely. And alive, my dear. The precious Findekáno, with his musical laugh, would be a wonderful addition to my personal collection. Although they affirm that he no longer laughs as before”, he concluded with a tone of false regret.

Faenar saw the slave raise his face. He saw his mouth twist down as if he didn't understand ... and the next thing he knew, it was time seemed to freeze.

For a moment the room was silent, all eyes on the scene unfolding on the throne. Then there was an outburst of screaming and cursing. The humans did not move from their seats, puzzled and the same Faenar sat, petrified with surprise.

With a feline leap, Fingolfin had risen to his feet and had circled the arm of the stone seat to head straight for the Dark Master's throat. His two hands closed around the Vala's blackened neck and squeezed with animal force.

A Balrog managed to reach the throne, but before he managed to use his double-edged sword to bring down the prisoner, Fingolfin spun on the spot and grabbed Morgoth by the hair to shove him between him and the fire demon. The balrog halted his attack in time not to pierce his master's chest and stepped back.

Entrenched between the back of the throne and the Vala himself, the slave wrapped his arm around Morgoth's neck while the other hand — claw-chipped — scratched his face.

Morgoth emitted a roar of rage as he felt the nails tear at his skin and wrapping the chain around his wrist, he pulled forward. Fingolfin shot over his shoulder and fell to his knees before the throne. Morgoth tugged on the chain again, tightening the necklace. The elf tried to loosen the pressure with his fingers, but he only managed to scratch his own neck. Finally, he stopped resisting and fell backwards, passed out.

The Dark Master loosened the pressure on the chain and tugged on it, dragging his body toward him. However, as soon as Fingolfin reached the foot of the throne, he leaped to his feet and attacked again. This time, he seized the Vala's hand and bit the hand to which the chain was attached.

Morgoth howled in pain and rage, shaking the slave away from him.

Fingolfin crossed the room on impulse; but as soon as he touched the ground, he sat up on both feet with agility. Morgoth's dark blood bathed his mouth and chin, and he gripped the end of the chain in his hand. He turned against the orcs trying to get closer, showing bloodied teeth in a wild grimace.

"Gothmog!" The Dark Master roared.

Faenar sensed the movement of the Balrogs leader's golden and black mane and rising to his feet, launched into the attack.

Fingolfin struggled in the arms that had just caught him. Two firm hands folded his arms back, squeezing them behind his back.

_“Quiet, idiot!”_ Faenar roared in his mind.

_“My son!”_

Fingolfin's howl stabbed at his mind like a burning ice sword.

_“He won't touch my son! I'll rip his eyes out! I’ll eat his heart! I'll make him swallow his own cock! But he won't touch my son! Never!”_

_“You won't be able to do much if the Balrogs use their whips on you!”_ Faenar managed to reply as he struggled to contain him.

_“You survived. I will survive ... And I will kill him.”_

_“No, you will not. He's a God. And you can't kill a god. You will only get him to kill you. And then put Fingon in your place at his feet.”_

_“You are the one at his feet! I will show you that a god can be killed.”_

Faenar was about to let him go just to see if he followed through on his threat; but at that moment he saw Gothmog approaching, unrolling the fire whip and with clenched teeth, he turned Fingolfin in his arms and head-butted him in the face.

The screams and rage in his mind suddenly died down. In his hands, the slave was lifeless. He held him against his side with one arm, ignoring Gothmog's expression.

"My lord," he said, addressing Morgoth, "your slave is controlled."

The Dark Master of the World looked at him suspiciously. Faenar stepped back and let Fingolfin collapse to the ground, but he kept close enough to retrieve him if Gothmog advanced.

Morgoth's face relaxed.

"Always on time, my dear Faenar. You were the only one who thought of containing it ... without damaging it.”

"It is your property, my lord," said Faenar innocently. “How dare I harm something that belongs to you? Something ... that do you value?”

"Thank you, dear," the Vala smiled, sliding on the ground so that his limp was barely noticeable.

He stopped in front of Faenar and without looking down at the slave, he ordered:

"Take the slave to my quarters and chain him to my bed. Don't touch it.” His gaze fixed on the captain, he said softly, raising a hand to stroke his cheek. “You will be rewarded for your loyalty, my dear.”

"As you wish, my lord," Faenar shrugged.

When Morgoth turned to get away from him, Faenar noticed his left hand bleeding profusely and taking a closer look, he saw that a finger was missing - the same one that wore the ring attached to the chain and that Fingolfin was probably still squeezing in his clenched fist.


	11. Chapter 11

Two nights after the incident, a maia came looking for Faenar on behalf of the Dark Master.

The Angband captain had been in his quarters all day, but likewise, he took his time to bathe and groom himself. He did not need a detailed explanation to guess why he was called.

As he crossed the dimly lit corridors that connected to the cavern in which the Dark Master's chambers were located, Faenar considered the possibility that Morgoth had tortured Fingolfin to the point that he confessed the details of the seven nights spent in his bed.

A shiver ran down his spine and he thought of going back for his ax. He immediately convinced himself that it was stupid. If Morgoth knew, he could kill him whether he was armed or not; if he did not know, he would put him on alert by being defensive when he always came to these calls ... willingly.

_Willingly_.

With the memories that Fingolfin shared with him - and that he somehow knew were ingrained in his soul - Faenar wondered how he could enjoy sex with the Dark Master as he had before. A part of him still doubted the veracity of such memories. More than a few claimed that the elves were able to invoke images and emotions in others with their songs of power. But Fingolfin had been stripped of his voice by Mairon's magic: how then could he have distorted his perception to the point of feeling that those memories were real? Real for _whom_? For Fingolfin they were indisputably, and Faenar could not help but be surprised by the strength of the feelings that the former elf king still professed to the brother who betrayed him.

Once again he wondered how many of those feelings were his - yes, _his_. The captain of Angband admitted that, within him, the desire to be the cause of such feelings was a bonfire that consumed his sanity. He wanted to be the one to provoke the slave's desire and love. Even if there was no such bond that Fingolfin spoke of, his soul had accepted - rather devoured - what the elf's soul offered him. He yearned for it with tooth and nail, with the hunger of fire, with the persistence of lava. If right now Fëanáro, the son of Finwë and Míriel, returned from the dead to reclaim Fingolfin's love, Faenar would destroy him with his own hands, devour his heart as the avarin of the Wolf Tribe did to his enemies.

He was almost surprised by the intensity of his emotions when it came to the Mad King - _almost_. He didn't remember being this possessive with anyone before - with nothing. At the beginning of his awakening, the Dark Master had called him to his bedroom too often to feel that someone might displace him in his preference. When Morgoth began to enjoy other distractions, Faenar was already convinced that he would not be discarded and also knew that he could live without the Master's attention. If he still missed the light of the silmarils on his skin, that was something he couldn't fight against. Until now.

For years - centuries - he had searched his various lovers for the discharge of energy that the proximity of the gems caused in him. Fingolfin had given him more than that shock. A drug. Sex with Fingolfin had the same effect as shamanic drugs in some: Faenar had seen elves cut their throats in the ecstasy of hallucinogens. Now he understood that emotion - that need to tear the skin to expose the soul, to touch the soul of the other.

He was puzzled to find himself standing before the golden door of the Dark Master's chamber. He had gotten there without noticing it, deep in thought.

He took a deep breath and pushed the blade with one hand.

As soon as he crossed the threshold, the scent of blood filled his lungs. Disgust and hunger swirled in his stomach. He licked his lips, evoking an image in which blood - **that blood** \- spilled into his mouth. His eyes narrowed, drawing in the ferrous, sweet scent harder ... and he knew he had really tasted that blood once.

"Oh, you're here, my beautiful one."

He opened his eyes to see the Dark Master.

The Vala had just passed under a silk curtain. He only wore a dark velvet robe - an undefined shade between black and red - that hung open from his muscular shoulders, stripping his body. As an Ainu, Morgoth was beautiful beyond elven beauty; however, something was different about him. His skin was a grayish shade reminiscent of marble, and his dark hair fell in uneven curls. On his torso and thighs, the seven marks of his combat with the elf king looked like pale lines — veins in the marble. When walking, his limp was more noticeable.

He wore the iron crown and the three gems glittered on his aquiline features, reinforcing the blood luster of his golden eyes.

Faenar's gaze rose to the gems. As every time, his soul was caught in the light of the jewels. He felt his hands sting for the desire to touch them.

_... he has broken your connection to those damn stones and restored the bond between us._

Fingolfin's words woke him up. He frowned slightly and looked down ... at the Dark Master's bloody hand.

He froze. He didn't need to guess to know who the blood belonged to and his heart stopped before it began to beat so loudly that it rumbled in his ears, drowning out Morgoth’s like-dark-velvet-voice.

He blinked at the caress on his cheek. He fixed his eyes on Morgoth's face, just inches from him.

"My lord," he said calmly.

"I was longing to see you tonight -to have you here. It's been a while since you've been here, hasn't it, precious? I feel like I've neglected you.”

"You were distracted by your ... new slave."

Morgoth smiled crookedly.

"It's not as fun as you are. Nobody is like you.”

"I am flattered to hear you, my lord," Faenar raised an eyebrow.

Morgoth took one of the fine braids sealed with a ruby bead between his fingers and brought it to his nose, smelling with delight.

"I missed your scent," the Master mused as he leaned down and buried his face in Faenar's neck.

The Vala's burning lips left a wet groove from his ear to the depression between his clavicles. His hands removed the captain's light clothing, pulling here and there to bare his torso.

Faenar knew what would follow: Morgoth was neither patient nor considerate. He drank, drank ... and if he was in a good mood, he let his lover achieve pleasure, but it didn't take long to make him feel comfortable.

He had never cared: during all that time, he had only felt the need to fill, to fill a void that persisted. And now he knew _why_.

He rebelled against the memories of those seven nights. No. It was not for this torture that he chose the slave as his reward.

He opened his eyes and fixed them on the gems - radiant as if all the light in the world was on them. That. That was what he wanted, what he needed. The caress, the light of the silmarils kissing his bare skin.

Anxiously, he buried his hands in the Dark Master's hair and reached for his mouth in an impatient kiss, without taking his eyes off the gems.

When Morgoth pushed him onto the bed and made him lie on his back while stripping off his pants, Faenar kept his attention on the silmarils, yearning for them, panting only at the thought of touching them, of feeling their magic - a magic he had known once, in a time forgotten by his soul.

He opened for the Master of the World, arching into his possession, groaning under his breath, letting himself be carried away by the desire for light.

When he descended from the peak, breathing heavily, Faenar licked his lips. His fingers still twitched between Morgoth's dark loops and his body ached. The semen moistened his belly and his thighs. He closed his eyes so as not to see the Dark Master's satisfied smile.

"It is always a delight to have you, my precious gem," Morgoth smiled against his mouth, pressing a sloppy kiss. “Stay," he added. “It's been a while since we've been together and I'm still not satisfied.”

"I have a proposal for you, my lord," declared Faenar in a raspy voice.

Morgoth raised his head to look at him with a raised eyebrow.

“A proposal?”

The captain nodded and opened his eyes to look at him.

"I will bring you the elf king. Fingon," he said. “I'll bring him to you alive and ... healthy. He’ll be yours.”

Interest lit up the Vala's golden pupils.

"And ... what do you want in exchange for that service, my beautiful Faenar? Seven more nights with the slave?” He suggested with a mocking smile.

Faenar almost held his breath. Maybe he could exchange it. Maybe if he gave Morgoth a new toy, he could keep his spoils.

He licked his lips.

"One night," he said.

Morgoth frowned at his low price.

"With you and him. One night ... sharing him with you. Before, ”he said quickly. “Before I go hunting Fingon. You have thought about it, my lord. I know -So you will see that it is not worth changing me for him.”

Laughter shook Morgoth's chest, who quickly left the bed to pour himself a glass of wine.

"You flatter me, Faenar," he said, still laughing. “I accept the change. I will take you while you take him. And maybe the other way around.”

“When…?”

"Oh, tomorrow. I am looking forward to having my two jewels together. And I'm longing for you to bring me the little singing king. Perhaps… we can make other exchanges later: there are still a few elven princes that I would like to have in my… treasure. Mairon!”

At his cry, the Necromancer appeared, raising the silk curtain.

Mairon's golden eyes darted across Faenar's nakedness before focusing on his master's body, with a flash of lust.

"Did you call my lord?"

"Fix the ice doll," Morgoth ordered. “For tomorrow."

And turning to look at the captain, he added: " We have plans for him.”


	12. Chapter 12

"Your soul is restless."

Faenar looked up from the ax blade, which he had been polishing for a while, and met the dark eyes of the avarin sorceress.

Engelil toyed for a moment with the feathers adorning her hair.

"Which is strange because it's finally complete," she added without looking at him.

"What are you mumbling, witch?" Balcheth chimed in, frowning.

Engelil ignored the other female and simply approached Faenar. Leaning a few inches to bring her face up to his, she muttered:

"All this time, since I first saw you at the solstice party, your soul has been incomplete. Like a broken mirror that someone assembles leaving missing pieces, forcing the ones they managed to put together. But now, your soul is whole. And it’s restless. As if it no longer fits inside your body and needs to turn into something else, _someone else_. If you were an elf like us, I would say that you need your mate.”

Faenar narrowed his eyes. Was it so obvious? Could anyone else see if two people had formed a bond?

"Nonsense," he laughed scornfully. Y”ou said it: 'if I were an elf'. But I'm not.”

"An elf like us ... certainly not. But what are you, Faenar of Angband? And why is your soul restless now when it was always… satisfied?”

Faenar rose to his feet, forcing the Avar to back away.

"What I am is bored."

"But that will change in a few hours," Draugnir suggested, laughing like a wolf. “Our captain will have a memorable night.”

Engelil raised an eyebrow and her mouth curled into a grimace.

"It may be memorable for reasons other than what you imagine," she said. “Our captain may not like what he will find in the Dark Master's chamber.”

With the echo of Engelil’s threat ringing in his ears, Faenar made his way to the World Master's chambers.

Why was he doing it? He asked himself again. Why venture out to see Fingolfin in Morgoth's presence? Why venture to let the Dark Master discover the feelings the slave awoke in him? Why risk emotions taking over him when Morgoth ...? To check that Fingolfin was safe. To ensure that the Dark Master gave his prisoner one more chance to live. _To see him again._

He entered the bedroom without announcing himself.

Morgoth rose to receive him. Like the day before, he wore his hair down and the iron crown on it. The light of the _silmarils_ spilled onto his beautiful and terrible features. Naked under the silk robe, the Dark Vala, lord of Arda, was a spectacle difficult to resist.

However, Faenar watched him only a moment before his attention drifted to the kneeling elf at the foot of the bed.

Surprise stopped his heart. The silver ribbon had been removed from Fingolfin's face and now his eyelids were open, showing two oval aquamarines. The image was shocking: the gems returned the torchlight, lifeless, turning the prisoner's beautiful face into a death mask.

Faenar contained the cry of despair that rose to his throat.

“Do you like it?” Morgoth inquired into his ear, putting an arm around his waist. “A memory of Valinor, of when Fingolfin was the prince loved by the Valar and the elves.”

He didn't need his words to know it. The memory was a viper biting his heart, spilling poison into his entrails.

He saw the statue, the marble bust emerging from under the silk cloth, an exact copy of the face of Indis' eldest son, his half-brother. He had made that sculpture with his own hands, following Nerdanel's advice. In the place of the eyes, he had put aquamarines - perfect, smooth, with soft silver glints inside.

_An impressive job_ , Finwë had commented.

_Less beautiful than the original_ , he smiled at the time, looking at his brother newly arrived of legal age.

_My eyes don't look like that_ , Fingolfin complained later, sitting on his lap.

_Of course not. No gem can compare to your eyes. Your eyes are more beautiful than the stars of Arda._

Oh Eru. It had been him. It had been for him that Morgoth took the eyes of the elf king. He had seen that moment in his memories. He had…

He understood that the Dark Master knew of the past between them - perhaps not about the bond, but the rest. The love, the passion, the sin, the rage, the jealousy ... the pain ... the pain of losing him, the always lacerating pain that the silmarils left when he broke his soul to make them.

That. He had put a part of his soul into those infernal stones ... and had broken the bond that bound him to Nolofinwë.

_It was they who pulled us away once._

He knew it. Fingolfin knew that. Fingolfin knew that his own stupidity - his arrogance, his arrogance - had broken the delicious chain between them. But after his fight against the Balrogs, with his body and soul destroyed, Mairon had rearmed his soul with his dark magic. He had forced the fragments to fit, ignoring the missing ones… and the bond had been glued together, not knowing what it was. Until Fingolfin fixed it with his own soul. And now, _it was whole_.

With his gaze fixed on the prisoner's expressionless face, he realized that what called him from the silmarils were the fragments of his old soul that slept in them. He didn't need them, but he wanted them.

"A winter and frost warrior."

Morgoth's dark voice drifted through his thoughts as his hands removed the middle clothing to caress his chest, lingering on his nipples.

"After tonight, he will return to Mairon's estates, and when you return with the elf king, Fingolfin will be a new, eternal creature." He turned Faenar in his embrace. “I will have two perfect warriors, greater than Eonwë and more beautiful than Varda's stars. Mine for all eternity.”

He leaned down to claim Faenar's mouth, who let him do, baffled.

_A winter and frost warrior. A new, eternal creature. His ... for all eternity._

He remembered the pain, the agony of the burning and dark birth. He remembered how many times his ax took a life - an elven life. He thought of all the times he was about to destroy with his own hands - with his power - those he loved. He thought of the horrible delight of watching the flames devour the lives of his people, of the assault he led at Dorthonion to take the lives of Angrod and Aegnor, _his nephews_. He thought of his curiosity as he witnessed the duel between the elf king and Morgoth.

He tried to imagine Fingolfin doing all of that.

“No!” he shouted, pushing away the Dark Master.

Morgoth stepped back, frowning.

“How do you say?”

“No!” He repeated angrily. “You will not make him into a monster. I won't let you hurt him anymore. I prefer him dead, free of you, in the hands of Mandos.”

Understanding lit up the Vala's eyes.

"So ... that's what you want, isn't it?" He said, smiling. “You prefer him dead rather than sharing him, before… losing him to someone else. Oh, my precious Faenar, we are so alike you and me.”

Faenar roared under his breath, clenching his fists. Morgoth laughed out loud.

"There's nothing you can do to stop it," he shrugged. “You brought him here, remember? You charted this destiny for him. And you belong to me. As much as the silmarils belong to me.”

Faenar's gaze rose to the gems.

His. Like the _silmarils_.

_I want you to be free._

He did not want to be free; not really. But Fingolfin – **Nolofinwë** –does. He would not be a slave, without memories, without pieces of his soul. He will not. Not his star. Morgoth would not have his most precious gem.

Anger erupted like a bloody flare.

He sensed the Vala's stupor when he jumped on him. Heat welled up from his body with the force of a thousand suns. This… this had been given to him by Morgoth in exchange for his stolen memories and now he would use it against him.

He struck the Vala's face with his forehead, delighting when he saw blood running from the broken nose. He kicked the god's abdomen, forcing him to bend over on himself.

Morgoth roared in pain, staggering and anger flared on his face.

Faenar attacked again, but this time, the Dark Master caught his leg with one of his claws and yanked him off against the bed.

He fell to the ground, gasping for pain. He stood up nimbly, but the blow to his face made him collapse into gloom. He shook his head and regained his vision to find Morgoth on top of him. The god's huge hands encircled his throat.

"Do you think you can beat me?" Morgoth roared. “I'm going to destroy you with my own hands. And then I'll remake you. And again. For all eternity, _Fëanáro_.”

The elf fought against the powerful claws. He tried to release his power, but the fire spread through Morgoth's arms without damaging him. His vision began to close in a black circle.

All for nothing. Morgoth would steal his memories again. When he woke up, Nolofinwë would be nothing to him. Nothing more than another slave, another toy of the Dark Master.

The roar of despair ripped through his chest.

Suddenly, the pressure on his neck eased. He gasped and coughed and opened his eyes to see Fingolfin rise behind the Dark Master, squeezing his blackened throat with the chain that tied him to the bed.

Morgoth threw his hands back, clawing at the Mad King's face and arms, but Fingolfin did not move away, pressing harder and harder.

Faenar rose to his feet, leaped onto the Vala, and seized the iron crown. He turned the piece in his hands and pressed the _silmarils_ against the face of the Dark Master of the World.


	13. Chapter 13

The stench of burned meat filled the room. Morgoth's screams shook the air and the walls around them.

Finally, the screams stopped abruptly and Morgoth dropped his arms.

Faenar stepped back, still holding the crown, and saw the burned black face of the once beautiful Vala. For a second, he thought the punishment awaiting him would be terrible: when Morgoth woke up, he would tear off his skin and remove his organs while he lived. He had seen it before.

Fingolfin released the chain, and the Dark Master fell forward with a thud, knocking Faenar out of his abstraction.

"We have to go," he said, looking around for a way out.

The corridor would be a madness. The guards would surely arrive in seconds: it was impossible that they had forgotten Morgoth's screams.

The jingle of the chain being shaken attracted his attention. With a growl, he passed over the Vala's body and grabbed the chain to pull it with both hands. It didn't even give a bit.

_You must hurry up._

Fingolfin's voice entered his mind with his usual refreshing calm.

_Orcs and Balrogs will arrive at any moment. You can't be here when it happens. You know the fortress ..._

"Stop talking," Faenar hissed and ran to the velvet curtain that concealed the other room.

He stopped just after the threshold, looking around the site. He ignored the too-small instruments, the metal and stone beds, the chains hanging from the ceiling and the walls ... He crossed the room and grabbed a kind of short ax before returning to the bedroom.

He knelt down next to Fingolfin and stretched the chain on the ground. The first hit only damaged the links.

Fingolfin grabbed his arm before the second landed.

_You have to go. Now. Take the silmarils._

"I don't want the damn _silmarils_ ," he barked angrily.

Fingolfin drew back, stunned, and Faenar released his hand to strike the chain again. The metal exploded and he stood up, dragging the prisoner by one forearm.

“Let's go. I know the way to the barracks and from there to the mines. We can go up to Thangorodrim towers using the freight elevators...”

_I can’t go with you. I can't help you fight._

For the first time, Fingolfin's mental voice expressed defeat, fatigue, and Faenar stopped to look at him. He took his face in both hands.

"Let's go together," he promised in a passionate whisper. “I'm going to leave this hell with you, for you ... to be who you want me to be.”

_It would be much better if you took the stones._

"We will return for them. One day. Today -We don't have the tools to rip them off the crown and that shit is too heavy.”

_If you take the stones ..._

"Shut up," he ordered before kissing him briefly and painfully.

He pulled away quickly, fearing he would lose sight of what was urging and pulled Fingolfin after him out of the chamber.

He heard the voices and the heavy rush of enemies. He clenched his teeth before running down the hall.

Fortunately for them, the guards who kept watch over the slaves did not frequent the throne room. Many were still more elves than orcs, but memories of their pre-Angband lives were barely a haze in their minds and many never even saw the King of the Gelydh. It was also not uncommon for one of Angband's captains to bring a slave who would have disliked them to the deepest barracks.

Faenar moved through the work areas until they reached the mine tunnels without being stopped. They had no weapons, so a fight would not be a good idea. He didn't stop until they had entered one of the less-traveled tunnels and was able to approach one of the freight elevators that carried the metal to the forges, several levels above.

The elevator was a metal wagon that was driven by a chain and pulley system. He made Fingolfin climb into the carriage and climbed alongside him. It was not uncommon for guards and foremen to use this method to avoid ascending through the intricate network of corridors and passages that connected the various levels.

_How will we get out once we're up?_

_Using one of the forge stacks_ , Faenar explained using mental communication as he turned the pulley to raise the car.

_Are we not at risk of… dying burned?_ Asked Fingolfin, crawling around the bottom of the car on all fours to help him with his task.

Faenar accepted the help, and the box rose faster with the effort of both.

_There are vents halfway. They face the mountainside and we can go out through one of them. Leave it to me. I will get you out of here._

Angband's forges were always boiling. Most of the blacksmiths were elves and some maiar in Mairon's direct service. It was fortunate that the Necromancer no longer visited the workshops, since he had dedicated his talents to working on materials more _delicate_ than metals and gems.

Some artisans stopped their work to greet the captain of Angband with a nod, but they paid no attention to the half-naked slave. It was normal to see them there –whether working, serving as an experiment or simply to be used as… _material_.

Faenar gave thanks for the instinct that years ago led him to the forges to occupy his leisure hours. Although he barely managed to create something worthy of attention, he had had the opportunity to explore the place - perhaps, deep down, he was always thinking of escaping.

He found a disused oven, with the charcoal still giving off heat and taking a quick look around, he pushed Fingolfin inside.

_Climb. I'm going after you_ , he ordered through the bond.

They climbed up the rugged walls. Faenar fervently thanked the existence of the bond, which allowed him to guide Fingolfin in a terrain that the blind king did not know.

After almost two hours of ascent, Faenar spotted a ray of light and warned his companion to get into the hole. As he had expected, it was a vent that in just a hundred meters led them outside.

They were outside, on the slopes of the mountains and above them, the moon crept slowly across the sky.

Without stopping for air, Faenar took Fingolfin by the hand and pulled him to begin the descent from the mountain.


	14. Chapter 14

Fifteen nights. Fifteen nights had passed since they left Angband.

They had had little rest, earning as much time as possible. They both knew that Morgoth had likely recovered and that they were being hunted. If the Dark Vala himself was not behind them, it was because everyone knew that he had not left the fortress since his duel with Fingolfin - and had no intention of leaving it again.

Faenar wondered if Balcheth and Draugnir had been sent to chase him. Or if, in his rage upon seeing that they had escaped, Morgoth had destroyed his former servants. He said to himself that was the least they deserved, but so was he, and now he was trying to regain a life he wasn't sure belonged to him.

Lying on the grass, under the shelter of the trees, Faenar watched the starry sky.

They had finally left Anfauglith behind and entered Elvish territory. They had managed to evade the sentries - as he had done so many times before when he came to kill the elves. Faenar preferred not to meet anyone before he could deliver Fingolfin to his son.

He contained a sigh.

Of course they were going to Barad Eithel, again in Fingon's hands. He promised Fingolfin that he would save him. Now, what would happen next was the great unknown.

Faenar did not know how Fingon would take his story, his truth. How Maedhros would take it. He was a murderer. Unlike Fingolfin, who was always a prisoner, he had served the enemy and had found pleasure in doing so. They did not have to welcome him willingly. They had no reason to forgive him. They had no reason to believe him. Even if his face was identical to Fëanáro's.

Did he care about Fingon's forgiveness and acceptance? About Maedhros’s? The truth was, no. Although he felt the tug in his stomach that bound him to the Prince of Himring, the only thing that bothered him about all this was having to get away from Fingolfin.

He rolled onto one side of the body and looked at the sleeping elf.

Beautiful. A drug he didn't want to detoxify from. His treasure. His jewel. His star. _His_.

It didn't matter if he was Fëanáro or if he was a copy of Míriel's son. It didn't matter if Nolofinwë had clung to something non-existent in the madness of recovering his brother, his lover, his lost mate. Nolofinwë –Fingolfin –was _his_. He would not depart from him. He wouldn't let them take him away from him. Not Morgoth, not Fingon, not a hundred armies of Elves or Ainur. No one - **nothing** \- never again between the two of them.

He winced when fingers caressed his temple.

He found Fingolfin's closed lids ... and his smile.

_I hear you think_ , the king laughed in his mind. _You are like a waterfall that does not stop. Nothing will separate us. If you don't want to go to Fingon's ... we'll go somewhere else. Together. Away from everyone._

_I can't ask you that_ , he admitted, taking Fingolfin's hand in his to bring it to his lips.

_I came to this land just for you. Why couldn't you ask me to choose you above all ... if I already have?_

Faenar felt his chest burst with longing and...

He raised himself on one elbow and descended on Fingolfin to kiss him on the mouth, slowly, languidly, filling himself with his aroma and flavor.

Fingolfin broke free of his embrace and sat up with the agility of a teenager. He took a few steps away and quickly stripped off his dark pants.

Moonlight bathed his naked body, holding the breath in Faenar's throat.

Fingolfin whirled in front of him, his hair hanging down to his thighs like a blanket of ink and raising his hands above his head, he began to dance.

Faenar stared at him in fascination, a smile curving his mouth.

It was like going back to the past and, at the same time, it wasn't. They were two different - two completely different beings from those who loved each other in Míriel's garden, oblivious to the darkness and pain. But, on the other hand, they were the same. They had chosen this path long before tonight, long before Faenar chose to save Fingolfin above the light of the _silmarils_ , long before the night the captain of Angband asked a slave he found beautiful as a reward.

He stood up as he deftly stripped off his clothes.

Fingolfin smiled as strong arms wrapped around him from behind. He leaned against the other's chest, resting his head on his shoulder, still marking an imaginary tune with his hips.

Faenar swayed with him, still holding him, kissing his neck and his exposed ear.

"You are too happy, my star," he whispered in his ear.

_You are with me. What more can I ask for?_

_Maybe make love to you?_ He suggested in his mind.

Fingolfin only purred in response before turning in his arms.

Fingon hurried through the halls.

"Have them send a message to Círdan immediately!" He yelled at a guard without slowing down. “Send my son back! Soon!”

_Finno, my love?_

Maedhros's hoarse voice slipped into his mind as always. Fingon did not answer him and his husband stirred on the other side of the bond like a worried beast.

The Elf King pushed the double doors out of the hall and paused on the threshold, panting.

Erestor had to be crazy. Because only a madman could ensure that the elves found by the scouting patrol were...

His blue eyes fell on the couple standing in the middle of the room. With their hands clasped, one of them - the one who was now looking at him with eyes like beaten silver and frowning - hugged the other against his side, as if he wanted to make sure that no one would take it from him. Fingon was tempted to do so, but he only managed to murmur, in a strangled voice:

“Dad?” before bursting into tears.

On the other side of the bond, at Himring, Maedhros cried out and burst into tears with his husband.

**Angband**

"Should we be concerned?"

Morgoth asked the question barely moving his lips.

Mairon brushed aside the damp cloth with which he cleaned the wounds and leaned back slightly on the arm of the stone seat.

Little by little, the burns caused by the _silmarils_ healed. The markings on Thorondor's claws were gone - as was most of the Vala's beauty, the Necromancer realized with regret.

"How far did you go in transforming...?"

"Enough to give him half the power of his brother," he explained. “We have two powerful enemies, who know Angband, free and united with the elves. Yes, my lord, we must be concerned.”

Morgoth hissed in anger and pain as he turned his face away. His only useful eye was fixed on the iron crown.

"I don't understand why he didn't take them."

"He couldn't carry the _silmarils_ and take care of his blind brother," the maia explained patiently.

“That's what I don’t understand. Why did he choose Fingolfin over his precious _silmarils_?”

Mairon raised his eyebrows and smiled softly. Reaching out, he stroked the Dark Master's cheek, causing him to turn to face him.

"Because he's a fool," said Mairon without his strangely sweet smile wavering.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh the end!
> 
> Finally, this idea, which has been going through my head for almost a year, is out and finished.
> 
> Thanks for the support, for the beautiful comments that made writing this faster than I expected and more rewarding. Thanks for making this little story not go unnoticed.
> 
> And, I admit it: much of this AU is inspired by the work of Spiced_Wine and Kalendeer. Thanks for your great stories.


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